Norwegian Wood
by Roofran411
Summary: Laurence is in Reykjavik, Daniel is away on business, Frank chickens out of an audition yet again. He is drowning his sorrrows in whiskey and coffee when one of his fans begins to chat him up.


**Norwegian Wood**

As soon as I saw **'The Very Thought of You'** (or _Martha meet Frank Daniel Laurence_), I knew I wanted to write a FF. Not about dull and boring Laurence and Martha but about drunk, bitter, vulnerable Frank. A much more interesting character but I couldn't get a handle on him.

My friend **Anyother,** fellow Rooftopper and FF writer, wrote a series of brilliant vignettes about Frank. In one, she mentioned that he was bullied at school; in another, the call from his brother and his Gran's party.

With her permission to use these details, I had something now...

I was trying to think, head phones on, I-tunes on shuffle and John Lennon's acid tones and words slid into my head.

And I had him!

I didn't create Frank, he belongs to Peter Morgan. I only borrowed him. I did create Sophie; I hope she lives up to him.

Frank, of course, was played by Rufus Sewell. I see Sophie as looking something like a flame crop -haired Carey Mulligan.

.

I have given this story a **M** category for some profane langauage and a little adult content.

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The song is Norwegian Wood: written and sung by John Lennon.

.

I once had a girl or should I say she once had me.

She showed me her room.

Isn't it good?

Norwegian wood.

She asked me to stay and told me to sit anywhere.

I looked around and I noticed there wasn't a chair.

I sat on a rug

Biding my time; drinking her wine.

We talked until two and

Then she said

It's time for bed.

She told me she worked in the morning and started to laugh

I told her I didn't and crawled off to sleep in the bath.

And when I awoke,

I was alone,

This bird had flown.

So I lit a fire.

Isn't it good?

Norwegian wood.

.

* * *

><p><strong>Norwegian Wood<strong>

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He burst out of the Stage Door. He couldn't get out fast enough, gasping like an asthmatic, as though he needed fresh air.

Fresh air? London? Hah!

He leant against the wall for a minute, taking deep breaths, and then lit a fag. He went down the lane and turned into the small convenience shop on the corner, and bought a half bottle of whiskey. Tesco's was cheaper but this was nearer.

He opened it, took a mouthful, then another. He needed to sit down. Crossing the road he went into a Burger King. He would have to buy a coffee but it meant he could sit at a table for as long as he liked without hassle. Taking his coffee, he moved down the cafe. Not a window table, nearer the middle with his back to the counter. He had his choice. There was only one other customer. Sitting down, he pulled out the bottle from the pocket of his long overcoat. He unscrewed the top and took a long swig. He coughed, it burned as it went down, but it was good.

Christ, ten o'clock in the morning, he was getting earlier.

He held the bottle in both hands, his arms resting on the table, cradling the coffee. He brooded about the past hour.

He had gone for the audition at the National, confident that he was word perfect, knowing where he wanted to go with it. There were twelve of them up for it. He knew most of them; he knew he was better than they were.

As the line went down, the panic set in, as he knew it would.

As it had before, so many times.

When there were only three left before him, he got up. Pushing past them, he muttered something about needing the bog and almost ran out.

He unscrewed the bottle cap again and took another gulp, shuddering as it went down.

A blast of air hit him as someone came in and sat at a nearby window table. He didn't turn; he was too deeply in his misery to care.

Daniel had put him up for this audition. Again!

He had run out on it. Again!

Daniel would row with him. Again!

Daniel was his friend, his agent. Daniel was a millionaire, and he was just a microcosm in his empire.

Friend! Hah!

Sometimes, most of the time, _all of the time_, he hated him.

He contemplated his bottle.

Everything was starting to get a bit softer, blearier.

"Francis." He thought he heard it through the blur, but he ignored it.

"Francis?" Someone was standing by him.

Only under-ten year olds called him that.

Jesus, had they released fucking Peter Pan again or the sodding TV series that came out of it? Or was it Treasure Island?

There would be another flux of fan mail from kids he was almost old enough to have fathered.

Who was he kidding? At 28, he _was_ old enough.

At least there would be a cheque coming in from it.

"It_ is_ Francis, isn't it?"

He glanced sideways. Yeah! Little, maybe bigger than most. He tipped his head in acknowledgement.

"D'you remember me?" His Anna Scher training automatically clicked in through the alcoholic haze.

_Always be polite to your fans, always smile and __**always, always say you remember them.**_

"Yes, of course."

"Ok if I sit down?"

That jerked his head up. His fans did not usually ask that. They were too busy giggling, clinging to the mothers they usually had with them.

She was wearing a long full heavy coat that looked as though it was her mother's, and a knitted hat pulled right down to her eyebrows, covering her hair.

"Be my Guest." he said sarcastically.

She sat down, unbuttoning her coat.

Oh Christ! She was in for a stay. When was her mother coming to take her away?

He took another look. No, she was small but she was not a child. He pulled his fags and lighter out of his pocket.

"You can't smoke in here."

Jeez, that's all he needed... a bloody school prefect. He put them away.

"How are you?"

He pursed his lips and blew out. "Fine."

"You _do_ remember me?

He looked at her. He had never seen her before in his life.

"Of course."

When was she going?

His fingers drummed on the bottle. She picked up the bottle cap and taking the bottle from him screwed it on, and then put it down just beyond his hand.

"Where?"

"What?"

"Where do you remember me from?"

He tried to focus properly on her. He didn't have a clue. Somewhere when he had been blind drunk?

"That time ...you know ..."

"What time?"

You know... That, that time." he floundered. "A few months... weeks ago." She was nodding her head to encourage him. "we fucked..."

Her lips parted in a little smile; she had small even white teeth.

"You_ don't_ remember,_ do_ you?"

He opened his mouth to deny it but she cut in.

"Not if you think we fucked."

He ducked his head.

"Was I legless? I'm sorry, I wouldn't remember my mother if I was."

"How is she?"

"My mother?" His eyes widened in astonishment and he shrugged one shoulder. "I dunno. Haven't seen her for years."

"I'm sorry about that."

"Don't be. She don't wanna to see me; I don't wanna to see her."

"I liked her."

He squinted at her.

She knew his mother?

He shook his head to clear it.

"Sophie" she said.

What the hell was she on about now? Oh! Her name!

"Ohhh yeahh! So-ophie !" It still didn't mean anything.

"Sophie Macintosh? I wear contacts now."

She smiled her little smile again and pulled off her hat. Her hair was cut very short and close to her head with a heavy fringe down to her eyes. It glowed around her face, a deep rich copper.

A little girl's face swam into his mind. Small, skinny, with long thin plaits of the brightest ginger, one always coming loose; and John Lennon glasses that kept slipping down her nose: like a scrawny bedraggled kitten, if kittens wore glasses.

He screwed up his eyes in concentration, peering at her.

"Sophie Grafton? Sophie Grafton!"

"Now he remembers."

He remembered.

Orleans Junior school: he was eight years old the first time he saw her. She was six, her face dirt-streaked from scrubbing away the tears. Pulling her with him, behind the waste bins, to hide from the taunting, jeering bullies. Yeah, they both were bullied. She, because of her hair and glasses and he ... Well, because of everything but mostly his name.

He remembered.

Sitting behind the bins, sniffing, she had asked why he was bullied. He had said "Things, acting an' stuff, an' my fucking Francis name." and she had said "I think it is a lovely name. Francis. I shall call you Francis. "

And she did, throughout Junior school; tagging behind him and Daniel and Laurence, a small ginger shadow, mostly ignored, only just tolerated.

Later at Orleans Park Comp, whenever she saw him, it was always Francis, although they saw less of each other there.

"Where did you disappear to? At Comp? "

"We moved to Canterbury, got bullied there too. Different reason. Supposed to be funny. Wasn't to me... "

"You married? You said MacIntosh."

"No. That's my stepfather's name. It was easier." She shrugged and fiddled with her coffee cup.

He slouched deeper into his chair, his green eyes half closed, not quite focussed.

She looked around. "You sit here all day?"

"Nope, I usually walk along to the Tate Britain and sit there." She stood up, pulling her hat back on.

"Come on then."

He moved after her, then went back, picked up his bottle and shoved it in his pocket.

They went out into the damp grey morning.

"Do you still see Daniel and Laurence?" They had been his friends, not hers.

"Yeah. We-ell, Laurence is living in Reykjavik, he met some girl and... He came back for a couple of days a few weeks ago, when I was um" He trailed off."Daniel, yeah, I see Daniel. He's my agent. I hate his bloody guts. "

"You always did. At least, you said you did but you didn't really."

He looked at her out of the corner of his eye.

They walked along.

"You like Tate Britain? I'd've thought you'd prefer Tate Modern."

"Nah! Crap, big con. Pretentious gits looking at it!" He stopped, taking his bottle out of his pocket, took a swig and then offered it to her. She hesitated, then took a mouthful. She coughed.

"I like the Pre-Raphaelites. There's one there now, on loan ...I'll show you. I could look at it all day."

He swayed and she took his arm.

At the Tate, he went unhesitatingly to the room.

"There it is!" he pulled her down to sit beside him on the marble bench, in front of it.

"Flaming June. Lord Leighton." His voice slurred."Beeyooteeful"

The sun streamed down onto a sleeping woman highlighting the drape of her tangerine coloured dress and her glowing red hair.

They sat and looked at it, she glancing at him now and then.

"I gotta go." he said at last.

"Where are you going?"

"Out. Gotta have a fag."

She trotted after him, through the gallery, out on to the steps.

He looked to see how many cigarettes he had left in the packet, and reluctantly offered her one.

"I don't, thank you. Fancy a cup of coffee?"

"You could come back to mine'n have one. S'only round the corner."

It was. Around the corner, over the bridge and about three miles down the road, around another corner and in the middle of a rundown terrace.

She had to jog to keep up with him.

His was the back room on the top floor.

"Don't expect too much," he said. "It's a bit grungy."

It was! She looked around. Messy and untidy, maybe damp, but, at least it wasn't dirty.

"God!" she said "A Mary Quant graveyard."

"I always meant to paint it but I never had the money. Sit down."

She took off her coat. Underneath she wore leggings and a big bulky brown sweater-dress that drowned her.

The bed was the only place, so she sat there while he made the coffee. He sat on the floor and lit a ciggie.

"Why did you run out of the audition?" He shrugged. "You get stage fright?"

He paused."No, not stage fright" he said slowly. "More like audition fright." he was still, "Yeah,

maybe stage fright too."

Then, in surprise as it occurred to him, he asked, "How d'you know?"

"I was there."

"Auditioning? You in the business?

"Not auditioning, working. Assistant to the assistant to the assistant producer." He looked at her, squinting.

"MacIntosh? You related to Sir?

"My stepfather is a very distant relation of Cam, so distant, it's nearly out of sight. When I wanted out of Canterbury, he asked if there was anything, _anything_ going ..."

"How long you been in London?"

"Five months"

"Why didn't you get in touch?** I am** in the phonebook, _ Francis McEwan_, you know."His tone was sarky.

"I went to a party when I first came up. At the National. You were there. Your tongue was down Kate Winslet's throat and her hands were all over your bum. It didn't seem the right time."

He rubbed his chin on his knee, looking down.

"We snogged. It lasted three minutes and that's all there was. All there ever is at those things. Things don't last much longer with me anyway."

He hesitated.

"Why d'you leave Canterbury?"

"I broke up with someone; he wanted out. He said . . . It was like the Princess said, there were three of us in it."

"He had someone else?

"Not him. There was a ghost."

"A ghost?"

"I called him someone else's name when we were, you know, doing it.

"Christ" he spluttered with laughter. "No wonder he wanted out."

"Yeah, well. I was mortified but not really sorry."

"'Nother coffee?"He started to get up.

"Er, um, I ought to go."

He knelt before her.

"Don't go." he said, with a vulnerability that she recognised. The loneliness too.

She leaned forward to kiss him.

It was a sweet kiss, as sweet as candy, a gentle touch, trembling like a teenager's first. Her lips were warm and soft, parting as his arms went around her. She could feel his breath on her cheek

"Want to shag?" she whispered hesitantly.

Surprised, wondering, he looked at her face with its creamy skin and amber brown eyes.

Funny thing, he didn't remember her eyes: they had always been hidden by her glasses.

God, suddenly he did want to. He wanted to very much.

He nodded once, a slow dip of his head.

"You're not still plastered?" he gave a little cough of laughter.

"No. I'm not plastered." She took off her cap.

"You got somewhere I can put my contacts?"

He pulled her dress over her head to curl around her shoulders and undid her bra, and turned to take off his shirt and tee. When he turned back, she was still sitting holding the woollie to her chest.

"What's wrong? Changed your mind? "he said sourly.

She bit her lip and it came out in a rush.

"They made fun, in my other school. They called me names... **BB ...BT...ITT**"

He waited.

"Big Boobs, Big Tits, Immense Tremendous Tits..."

He covered his mouth with his hand to hide the smile and gently pulled the dress away. His eyes widened, his mouth opened and closed.

"They're spectacular" he said slowly. "Spectacularly beautiful."

Then his mouth closed on hers, drinking her in like a thirsty man. He pulled her closer and she slid her arms around his neck to be held tighter, tilting her head back, to look at him.

"Francis. I, I'm not very good. Robert said," she hesitated, and then she went on. "Robert said I was useless."

"I'm out of practice myself." He put his hand to her face, God I He wanted her!

She slipped her leggings down. He was unzipping his jeans, pushing his briefs off.

They moved together clumsily, with uncertain questioning touches,

Everything was so awkward and so needy.

His mouth was on hers again, his tongue searching for hers. Holding her closer and closer. She was quivering against him. He was shaking, overwhelmed by his desire for her, the urgency of it.

_For her?_

_For Sophie?_

They had been children together!

_Christ, did he want Sophie like this?_

_Had he ever wanted anybody like this?_

_Like a raging forest fire._

He lowered her with him to lie together:

She could feel him against her, pressed hard against her belly. Her breath was fast. his hands drifting over her back, her hands on his face, in his hair. He turned her onto her back. His hands cupping her breasts, searching and finding her nipples hard for him. A soft gasp escaped her.

"Francis, you got a Durex?"

"If I have, I don't know where the fuck it is. Shit! Shit!"

He rested his forehead against hers. He was shuddering with his need for her.

She moved "Sod it! Go on."

His mouth was against her throat.

"Sure?"

She shook her head.

"No. I'm not sure but don't stop." she murmured.

"I'll be careful."

She smiled the smallest of smiles.

"I bet you say that to all the girls."

"No ! No , only the ones with ITT."

The little giggle eased the tension but then wildness was back in him, driving them.

He became aware she was murmuring softly; whispering something over and over.

"Francis, Francis, Francis."

Then, "Don't stop. Oh God Francis don't stop.

.

"You ok, Soph?"

"Mm. You?"

"Mm." He turned to lie with one arm behind his head, the other around her; she turned into him, her face against his chest.

"Your ghost didn't turn up." He felt her smile.

"No."

She twisted the hairs on his chest around her finger.

"Did you mean what you said? About your Mum?"

"I dunno ...maybe ... sometimes... It was her birthday a few weeks ago; Simon rang and told me not to go there. I wasn't wanted."

He leaned across her for his cigarettes and lit one. Shit! The last one.

"I suppose I could see her on Saturday; if I wanted to. There's a party. My Gran's eightieth. She rang and asked me.

"Come if you like."

She looked up at him and snuggled down again. He finished his cigarette, closed his eyes and drifted off.

.

When he woke, the late afternoon's gloom was beginning to darken the room. He looked at his watch. Ten to four.

"Soph?" he said but he already knew.

She was gone.


End file.
